There are many things to love about the Spanish language. For instance, it has a wonderful cadence undergirded by its many vowels and a speed unmatched by that of almost any other language. And while this can present a steeper learning curve for students of Spanish, who often find themselves pelted by the heavy machine-gun fire of natives in a normal, everyday conversation, it is completely worthwhile.
As with many endeavors in which the steepness of the challenge is roughly proportional to the richness of the reward, learning Spanish has an immense amount to offer those who are persistent, passionate, and often shameless. And I say shameless because learning a language to a level advanced enough to be able to appreciate the extent of its many rewards requires a degree of shameless self-correction, a willingness to feel stupid (or awkward or childish or outré) in front of an individual or an entire party of people—and then to set the feeling aside, suppress your flopping fish of an ego, and move forward. Then you have to be willing to repeat the effort, make the same self-correction, maintain the same detachment, and then do it again, and again, and again, and again…and again.
And yet after all that ostensible effort that has carried me to the holy grail of language learning and given me access to the highest degrees of cultural penetration and appreciation for the finer quirks and subtleties of its speakers, I find myself appreciating something that could be considered trivial, a little facet of the language stemming from the history of Romance languages: the Latinity of Spanish.
That’s right, I love the Latin-derived words and compounds, prefixes and suffixes that abound in Spanish (and, for that matter, in English). Respirar for “to breathe.” Decantar for “to be inclined”. The existence of phrases taken nearly wholesale from Latin, such as motu proprio and ex profeso. The many shades of meaning that separate the verbs anteponer from posponer, sobreponer from suponer.
It could naturally be argued that because Latin-derived compounds exist not only in the other Romance languages but also in English, my native language, I have no reason to love Spanish on this account alone. And while that’s fair enough, and I do enjoy other Latin-influenced languages, I would still consider all this Latinity to be the tasty cherry on top of the many-layered cake that is the Spanish language. On that note, I would suggest that students of the language be patient; ability will come in time. Naysayers and negativists should keep their distance. And anyone and everyone who is an admirer, of course, is welcome to join the fun.
